Happening Films

Shorts

Features

Documentaries

Slate

Pig’s Blood

Feature Film

90 mins

Black Comedy

A 19-year-old gangster sent from Naples to Sydney to kill a celebrity chef finds himself in mayhem after falling for a trailer-trash Lolita.Based on the cult pulp noir by Peter Robb, Pig’s Blood is a confronting, violent yet comic thriller about people with dreams. It ends badly. People die. Twenty two years ago Pasquale left Naples with a suitcase full of money that didn’t belong to him. No one is ever out of Don Mimi’s reach though, even after hiding out for twenty two years in Australia. The Mafia Don decides to send a young man Salvatore to Australia to kill Pasquale. The problem is that Sal’s not too bright and easily seduced by glamour. Things get a whole lot more complicated when Sal meets Fayette, a trailer trash Lolita who just wants to have a good time and kill her stepfather.

Based on the novel by Peter Robb.

Writer/Director: Grant Scicluna

Producer: Jannine Barnes

Supported by Screen Australia

Chantou

Feature Film

90 mins

Drama

Unconventional gay couple Harry and James are parents to a Cambodian, adopted daughter, Lucy. On their annual trip to Cambodia they encounter trouble when the government revoke their adoption and refuse to let Lucy leave the country. Lucy’s real family never willingly gave her up but now Jorani and Davuth have financial and psychological battles that preclude them from welcoming her back immediately. New notions of family must be forged as they make the heartbreaking decision of what is best for Lucy.

Writers: Ben Pfeiffer and Grant Scicluna

Director: Grant Scicluna

Producer: Jannine Barnes

Australia/NZ Distributor: Curious Film

Supported by Film Victoria

The World Beneath

Feature Film

Drama

An unswerving portrait of a broken family whose members go to extraordinary lengths to reclaim their lives and relationships from the mistakes of the past.Winner of the People’s Choice Award for the NSW Premier’s Literary Award 2010, The World Beneath is a story of survival set against the might and unpredictable landscape of Tasmania. Once Rich and Sandy were part of the world famous blockade in Tasmania to save the wilderness. Now, twenty-five years later, the only thing they have in common is their fifteen year old daughter Sophie. When Rich decides to take Sophie, the daughter he barely knows, on a trek in the Tasmanian wilderness, his over confidence and her growing disillusion with him set off a chain of events that no one could have predicted. Instead of respect, Rich finds antagonism in his relationship with Sophie; and in the vast landscape he once felt an affinity with, he encounters nothing but disorientation and fear.

Based on the novel by Cate Kennedy

Writer: Cate Kennedy

Director: Grant Scicluna

Producer: Jannine Barnes

Executive Producer: Shaun Miller

Supported by Screen Australia

No Man is Innocent

Feature Film

In the lead up to Christmas 1965, Ronald Ryan engineers a daring escape from Melbourne’s maximum security Pentridge Prison. In the chaos, a guard is shot and killed. Upon his capture, and with the public baying for blood, Barrister Philip Opas is assigned the case that will not only define his career but will go on to shape the ethics of the nation. Convinced that politics, not evidence, is at play, Opas risks professional suicide taking up the fight to clear Ryan and save him from the gallows.

Writer: Jason Christou

Producer: Jannine Barnes

Noxious

Feature Film

Sci-fi, Thriller, Black Comedy

Dr Eva Pringle, a young scientist from Earth, is sent to the secret prison space station Nox Caligo to work out why the inmates have changed from violent psychopaths to peaceful loving farmers.It is the year 2083. The future is rosy. Crime and poverty are almost non-existent. Consumerism and capitalism still run humanity but it is mostly digital so the impact on the Earth’s resources is minimal. The Earth is run by four large corporations. Governments still represent the people but this is mostly illusionary. One of the corporations is owned by Richard Brandon, a charming billionaire, eco-friendly travel and media entrepreneur. Brandon owns and runs the private prison space-station Nox Caligo the existence of which is unknown to the general population on Earth. It is a multi-nation UN supported venture to incarcerate the Earth’s most hardened psychopathic criminals. It also serves as the location of one of the world’s most popular reality TV shows Noxious. Noxious is in trouble. Its success comes from the violent behaviour of the inmates, but over a very short time they have started to change in a striking manner. There is no more violence and instead the inmates have started to cultivate plants and trees. What has bought on this radical change? Dr Eva Pringle, a parisitoligist, and a team of experts are sent to Nox Caligo to investigate. Slowly, small changes begin to appear in the experts. Are they infected also? Eva questions their mission. Why are they really there? Who can they trust? Whose agenda do they serve to survive so they can return home?

Writer/Director: Susan Earl

Producer: Jannine Barnes

Box

Television

Fantasy Drama

6 x 30 mins

Someone on this street has a diseased mind and I will find out who”Residents of a suburban street, whose homes are used as locations for a popular TV soap opera, aspire to lifestyles presented in the show made on their street. The reality is quite different however, especially after a resident finds an unclaimed child amongst her hard rubbish. The line between fantasy and reality gets a whole lot more blurred when one of the show’s writers claims the boy is the manifestation of one of his abandoned storylines.

Writer: Chelsea Cassio and Grant Scicluna

Director: Grant Scicluna

Producer: Jannine Barnes

Mish Mash

Television

Children’s Mystery Comedy

Mish Mash is a children’s comedy caper about two girls who moonlight as costumed undercover reporters, solving intriguing mysteries for their school’s news website. Mish (Misha James) and Mash (Chandra Mashtra) are BFFs at Benchley Primary, an independent co-ed school.Misha is a savvy bundle of redheaded curiosity; while Chandra is a cool creative type with an off-beat wit. The spirited 11 year-olds have a weekly mission — to land an online cover story. In each episode, Misha and Chandra must get to the bottom of an issue or conundrum and publish by the deadline, under their handle ‘Mish Mash’. Chatty Misha presents in front of the camera; photography ace Chandra videos their interviews and antics. Their reportage is delivered in an energetic and playful style — just like the show itself. To crack cases, the girls go undercover at the drop of a hat. So it’s a good thing that Chandra’s loopy (but lovely) mother owns ‘Kandi Escapades’ — a costume shop which the girls raid to fashion disguises for their investigative stints. The stories pop up from anywhere within their school and neighbourhood — an everyday world filled with quirks and mysteries for those who have eyes to see them. The pair are always on the look-out for their cover story, which includes puzzling misdemeanours, strange events, and other enigmatic phenomena

Writer: Elizabeth Dias & Russell Bywater

Producer: Emma Haarburger

Executive Producer: Jannine Barnes

Amanda the Amazing Reptile Girl

Web Series

Children’s, Science and Nature

Hugo is obsessed with reptiles. He and his mum have had to start a new life after Hugo’s parents split up. A new school proves hard but Hugo meets Amanda who is more than just a girl – she is part lizard….! Joy for Hugo. Follow Hugo and Amanda’s adventures as they explore the natural world and the strange creatures that inhabit it.

Writer/Director: Susan Earl

Producer: Jannine Barnes

The Brooch

Winner: Monte Miller Award Best Unproduced Short Screenplay 2015

Shorts

Drama

A whimsical and bittersweet interplay between two young sisters struggling to cope with the absence of their ailing mother.

Michele is eight; her mother is sick in hospital and her father has passed away. She and teenage sister Suzanne must fend for themselves — dealing with their vulnerability by grappling with each other. Suzanne takes solace in ice-cream; Michele in stolen kisses. When Michele wears mother’s special brooch to impress her best friend, Suzanne comes down hard on her little sister and the time for denial is over. The Brooch is a story about the intimacy of childhood, of pushing loved ones away while drawing others closer. It explores the disquieting approach of grief at a delicate moment in young lives — how bonds falling apart can be gently woven back together.